


A Good Day

by Deannie



Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-10
Updated: 2014-06-10
Packaged: 2018-02-04 04:43:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1765891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deannie/pseuds/Deannie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nothing like a day that starts with dynamite. For the Fic_Promptly prompt "Magnificent Seven, OW, any, it ended as violently as it had started." Also fills the January 2003 "Where's My Horse?" challenge at the Mag7 Challenge Library (that part was totally inadvertent).</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Good Day

Vin Tanner lay in his wagon and stretched every muscle in his body, taking a deep breath of the cool air and smelling a whiff of smoke from the kitchen fires at the restaurant or the saloon or somewheres in the gray of early morning. He pulled on his clean shirt and got up to meet the sunrise. Somehow he could tell it was going to be a good day.

He was just stepping down from his wagon when a violent explosion rocked the ground beneath him, causing him to lose his footing for a second.

“What the HELL was that?!”

Chris Larabee’s bellow probably woke the few people who hadn’t been jolted out of bed a second before, as he banged the jail door open and strode out, heading for the wagon.

Weakly heard rifle and pistol fire followed the explosion and Vin tried to ignore the sounds of the town coming to abrupt life around him so he could pinpoint their direction.

“Where’s it coming from?” JD Dunne ran up, strapping on his guns.

“North of town, sounds like,” Vin told them. “Maybe Widow Run.” He watched Josiah Sanchez toting his rifle as he jogged up the street from the church, headed to the livery, where Nathan Jackson was just pelting down the stairs, doctor’s bag in one hand, rifle in the other.

That was five.

“Who had patrol last night?” Vin asked suddenly.

Another explosion rocked them on their feet and he realized that he shouldn’t have bothered to ask. The sight of Buck Wilmington rushing down the street, dressed haphazardly and frowning like he hadn’t left an empty bed behind, just clinched it. Anyway, was only one person Vin knew loved dynamite that much.

“Ezra,” he, Chris, and Josiah said together.

“Well, boys,” Buck said, smiling wide as they all headed in to get their horses. “Let’s see what he blowed up now!”

 

He’d blowed up a lot.

Widow Run was a large flat glen with a sparse scrub oak wood. There was a screen of large rocks and a small berm along the south side which would offer them—and hopefully Ezra—perfect cover to pick off anyone trying to ride in from the north.

Two stands of trees had been completely blown down, Vin could see as they rode in careful and stopped their horses at the bottom of the berm. Horses had bolted past them as they arrived, and he could see a few galloping north, making for parts unknown without riders to lead them.

Chris nodded to him when Vin motioned for the other peacekeepers to stay where they were while he slipped off Peso’s back and crept forward, trying to figure out who was where.

He found Ezra first, nestled sort of safe in the rocks. The gambler was using one hand to reload his guns, the other one covered in blood and useless at his side. Looked like he’d got his wing clipped pretty good, but it was clear he was still in the fight.

“Hey, Ez—” Vin cut off, jumping back as the newly loaded Colt swung up with surprising speed to aim at him. Ezra hissed in pain as he lowered the gun and peered back around the rock he was hiding behind.

“Good way to get yourself shot, Mr. Tanner,” he reminded his friend. He was high on the fight and grinned wide as he popped up like a jackrabbit and took a single shot. A curse from the other side of the wooded clearing told Vin his friend’s aim hadn’t been affected by his injury. “Sorry for the rude awakening, but these gentlemen simply weren’t going to wait for a decent hour to start their festivities.”

“Right unfriendly of them.” Vin took a quick look around, slid over a rock or two, and took aim, causing another gunman to shout out in pain. Vin shook his head. Damn sure seemed like a lot of people to fend off by yourself. “How many does that leave?”

Vin looked over when he didn’t get an answer. Ezra was sitting with his back against the rock, eyes closed, breathing hard. “Ezra?”

Green eyes opened slowly. “Just taking a moment, Mr. Tanner,” he assured him, turning back to the men they stood against. “I had a late game before my patrol and find myself unaccountably fatigued.”

Uh huh. “How many, Ezra?”

“Fifteen.” He took a shot and grimaced when it went wide. “Fifteen,” he repeated morosely. “I do hope you brought help. And bullets."

“Nah,” Vin told him with a smile, taking another shot (fourteen) and getting a better idea of where the other peacekeepers would do the most good. “Figured I’d let ‘em sleep. This ain’t bad odds.”

Ezra snorted, grabbing his bloody arm as he seemed to catch a spasm. “Be glad I dispatched the first half-dozen of them before you got here, then.”

“Blew up an awful lot of trees doing it, though.” With a light pat to the gambler’s good shoulder, Vin started to slip back to the others. “Taking the easy way out, eh, Ezra?”

He heard Ezra’s parting shot clearly above the fray. “I did procure the dynamite from your saddlebags, Mr. Tanner.”

Hell, he might have, at that.

 

The gunfight didn’t last much longer. With the odds suddenly seven on fourteen—well, it’d been thirteen by the time the rest of them got into position—the gunmen mostly figured they was better off giving up and facing the courts.

“So who the hell are they?” Chris asked. Man was grumpy. “And why were they trying so hard to take you apart?”

He whirled on Ezra, who was sitting right where Vin had left him, looking mighty peaked while Nathan tended to him.

“I’m afraid I didn’t get the names of any of those still living—” he immediately broke off and pointed at a squirrely looking guy JD was marching past. “—actually, his name is Clem, I believe. Sadly, I was caught listening in on their rather simplistic plans to ‘take on them damn regulators’ and rob the bank.” He was looking downright sick now. Nathan might’ve been keeping him from bleeding to death, but Vin knew from experience that the process was damn taxing.

“Caught ya spying, huh?” Vin didn’t believe that for a minute.

Ezra arched an eyebrow at him. “Not all of us are as adept at maneuvering through the wilds of nature as you are, Mr. Tanner,” he said, all uppity.

Yeah, that was just a bald-faced lie.

“You’s all lawmen!” A big hulk of a man was pointing at Ezra, who’d suddenly given up staying upright and was leaning boneless against his rock again. “He tried to blow us up!”

“Yeah!” Clem said, feeling strong now he had a buddy talking first. “We was just riding along—”

“All twenty-some of ya?” Josiah said calmly.

“Well... Yeah!” Clem replied. Was sounding a mite unsure now, though.

“Each with a pair of pistols and a rifle.”

“Now Josiah,” JD piped up, “that ain’t fair! Clem here only had one gun.” He grinned. “Had two rifles, though.”

“You were all just minding your business?” Josiah asked, still in that reasonable voice of his.

“...Yeah.”

Hell, damn near sounded like a question now. Poor kid.

“You may want to inquire as to what they planned to do with the gunpowder and charges I found in one of their saddle bags,” Ezra put in, all quiet and spent. He waved his hand at the unfamiliar saddlebag next to him with a satisfied smile. “I’m afraid you won’t be able to investigate the dynamite..."

Nathan clucked his teeth as Ezra faded out on them. Vin couldn’t tell if he’d fainted or he just fell asleep. “Gotta get him back to town, Chris,” he said. Didn’t sound too worried, but anyone could see Ezra needed to be in a bed. “I figure we can ride him double with Vin or—”

“Hey!” JD was looking around, a worried frown on his face. “Where’s Chaucer?” The frown went scared of a sudden. “You don’t think he’s..." A flailing hand motioned to the destruction.

“Hell, JD, Ezra’s had that horse for years,” Buck told him. “You don’t think the damn thing learned to duck by now?”

Vin nodded his agreement. No horse that couldn’t keep his head would’ve lasted long with a rider like Ezra. He put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loud: two long, two short.

“What’s that?” JD asked.

“It’s Ezra’s all-clear.”

Vin looked at the surprised faces around him. “Lord, you all been riding with the man for three years and you ain’t figured that out?” People just didn’t pay attention.

He looked around, expecting to see the gelding trotting up, slick as you please. After a long minute, he whistled again.

“Vin..."

JD’s concerned murmur got the tracker moving. He headed for Peso and slid on up into the saddle. “I’m going looking for him,” he said quietly. Lord, if something happened to that damn horse...

“Ezra can double with me,” Chris said, shooting Vin a look that clearly said “find him.”

“Let’s get a move on, then!” Chris’s command kicked them all into motion and Vin nodded to JD in reassurance as he stood in his stirrups and looked at the destruction around him.

Shit. How was he supposed to find anything in this damn mess?

 

After looking through the woods and finding two dead mounts that weren’t Chaucer, Vin made his way slowly around the glen... and found nothing. Oh there were a hell of a lot of tracks, but none with the dented shoes on the forehooves that signalled Chaucer had been anywhere near here.

“Where the hell are you, horse?” he wondered quietly. “It’s like you were never..."

Had he ever seen Ezra’s saddlebags? And he wouldn’t be rationing his shots if he’d had his own gear.

Vin kneed Peso back around to the west side of the glen where the godawful huge trail of the gang’s horses led into the scrub and dust. Hell, JD—blindfolded—could’ve tracked this, so since his concentration wasn’t needed for figuring out what to follow, he thought instead about where he was probably following it.

Founder’s Hollow. <i>Hell, Ezra,</I> he thought, <I>how’d you roust them out of there?</I>

Founder’s Hollow was a sweet little hidey hole northwest of town, a deep depression in the otherwise flat countryside. Closer to Four Corners than Widow Run, it was easily defended, a sort of natural fort. If Ezra had simply run back to town and got them all out of bed, they’d still have had to draw them out, or risk being cut to shreds by the outlaws’ firepower.

“So much for not knowing your way around the wilds of nature, Standish,” he murmured with a smile. Ezra probably waved at them, stole a horse, and led them into his trap neat as he pleased. And he was close enough to town for his fireworks to wake the whole damn place and bring the rest of them running.

There was only one problem with that plan, of course. Timing. If they’d’ve taken another half hour to get there, he’d’ve been overrun.

Damn gambler.

Vin rode toward the Hollow with his eyes and ears alert. It was possible—if only just—that some of the gang was still hiding here, waiting to finish the job or exact revenge or something. But the morning stayed silent and he rode around the top of the Hollow and found a smaller trail made by steel-shod hooves heading out to the west, away from both Four Corners and Widow Run. Shit, counting these horse tracks, Vin realized Ezra must have happened upon a gang of at least thirty-five.

The man had balls, no doubt there. Stupid as hell when it came to risk, but balls aplenty.

Coming nearly all the way around the Hollow, he finally found what he’d been looking for. Chaucer’s hoofprints were damn easy to pick out, if you knew the horse. Ezra had taught him to “dance” at some point, and the kids loved to see it. The repeated toeing gradually caused a wear on the front of the shoes. Luckily, Ezra hadn’t had Chaucer reshod lately.

The tracks led toward Four Corners, and Vin considered just riding out after the rest of the gang instead of following Chaucer, knowing he’d find the uppity bay in his stall, probably wondering when his man was going to come and give him his peppermint for a job well done.

Damn horse.

Figuring Chris’d kill him for taking the same kind of stupid-ass risk as Ezra, Vin turned to home and urged Peso into a fast trot, anxious to make sure that damn fool friend of his was okay.

 

The town felt right when he got there, and he knew that meant Ezra was doing fine. If he weren’t, Chris’s worry and JD’s out of control edginess would have tainted the air around them. Vin took a minute to take care of Peso and check on Chaucer. Ezra’d want to know he was doing okay. He poured a bit of sugar out of the stash he kept in his saddlebags and let Chaucer lip it off his hand before heading up to Nathan’s to see his friend.

Nathan was the only one there when he got there, besides Ezra, of course, who was sleeping like the dead on the cot. Man was unnatural. If he was hurt bad, or if he was feverish, he’d toss and turn and mutter... was hell to see. If he were just sleeping, though, you’d keep having to check him to see if he was still breathing, he’d be so still.

“He doing okay?” It wasn’t much of a question really, but he wanted to be sure.

“Exhausted is all,” Nathan said with a nod, focused on the bandage he was changing. “Lost a lot of blood, but the bullet came out easy and he ain’t running a fever yet.” He checked it one more time before he straightened up and looked at Vin. “Chaucer was here when we got here.”

“Yeah,” Vin agreed. “Ezra left him at Founder’s Hollow—must’ve stole one of theirs to draw ‘em out. Fool horse probably galloped into town right after we left.”

“Founder’s Hollow?” Nathan shook his head, putting away his tray of bandages. “Lord, we’d’ve been in a hell of a lot more trouble, we’d’ve met them there.”

Vin nodded. “Them and the other dozen that rode out to the east.”

Nathan’s eyes widened in shock and he turned to stare at Ezra in annoyance. “Damn fool is gonna get himself killed one of these days. He’d’ve been better off coming back into town for help. We still could’ve drawn ‘em out without him risking his life like that.”

Vin snorted. “Hell, he ain’t learned that lesson yet, Nathan. Doubt you’re gonna pound it into him now.”

Nathan smiled. “Nah, after three years, I reckon not.” He sat down, tired from the doctoring and the early morning, no doubt. “Damn glad we got there in time, though.”

“Damn lucky,” Vin whispered. Lucky it really was the good day he’d thought it’d be.

 

With Ezra on the mend, most of them congregated at the jail, figuring out who the gang was. Turned out Ezra’d already killed Billy McClaren, the younger of the two McClaren brothers, before the rest of the seven got there. The McClaren Gang had been devilling townships all around the Mexico border, robbing banks and killing people like gangs do.

“Ezra’ll be glad,” JD declared with a smile. “Billy’s got a $200 bounty on him!”

“Hell, he already owed me a drink for pulling me out of Miss Laura’s bed,” Buck said with a smile. “I say he owes me dinner, too.”

“What about Joe McClaren?” Chris was still focused on the ones that got away, and Vin figured he had the right of it. At least ten men had ridden out of Founder’s Hollow and gone the other way. No reason to think they wouldn’t be back. And now they’d be out for blood.

“I figured a couple of us would go out and track ‘em,” he offered, not as surprised as he could’ve been when Chris shook his head.

“No, I don’t want anyone else running into these men without backup.” He gritted his teeth and Vin knew that Ezra’s injury still rankled with him. “And we can’t leave the town unprotected while we hare off after them.” He sat on the edge of the sheriff’s desk. “Reckon they’ll come to us.”

Vin nodded. They’d just have to make sure they were ready for them when they did.

 

Vin took over for Nathan around dinner time so the healer could get some food. Ezra was still sleeping, but his fever had started climbing—something Nathan said he’d been expecting—and he needed someone there to watch him. The gambler tossed and turned every few minutes, and finally, just as the sun was setting, his eyes jerked open and he took a sharp deep breath.

“It’s okay, Ezra,” Vin told him quietly. “You’re home.”

Ezra lay back with a sigh. “Did Chaucer make it home all right?”

Trust the damn horse to be his first concern. “Course he did. Fed him a little sugar for his troubles.”

His friend clucked at him. “He’ll be wanting it all the time now.” He hissed as he tried to sit up and put too much pressure on his arm. Vin gave him a hand and got the pillows right for him. “Peppermints are a good deal less messy.”

“He’s a horse, Ezra,” Vin groused with a grin. “He don’t know the difference.”

“I’ll be sure to tell him you said so,” Ezra murmured. He looked around with fever-bright eyes. “Everyone else came through unscathed?”

“Yeah,” Vin reassured him. Was obvious since there was no one else in the clinic, but when you was injured like that, you never quite knew for sure what all happened while you were sleeping. “We’re just waiting for Joe McClaren to head in and start trouble again.”

Ezra nodded his understanding. “That would be Billy’s big brother? I never caught their family name.” He sighed. “I expect Mr. Larabee wanted to keep everyone together? I’d’ve thought it would do more good to have you track the miscreants down.”

Vin grinned. “You know Chris. Once one of us is hurt, he goes all Papa Bear on us all.”

“He is annoying that way,” Ezra agreed.

“Figured we’d stand a better chance of facing them here in town—”

A whoop and a volley of gunfire broke into the early evening quiet.

Ezra moved slowly to sit on the edge of the bed, grabbing the Colt in its holster where it hung on the bedstead. “It appears we’re going to find out if he’s right.”

“I WANT THE MAN WHO KILLED MY BROTHER!”

Vin turned to the man in question and smiled big.

“Hey, Ezra? Got any more of that dynamite?”

A crazy smile met his and Vin gave himself over to the thrill of the fight.

All in all, it was a good day, even though it ended as violently as it had started.

* * * * *   
the end

 


End file.
